The Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) today urged NSW parliamentarians to ensure children born into State-backed surrogacy arrangements have the benefit of the complementary love and care of both a mother and a father.

ACL NSW Director David Hutt said that in moving to regulate surrogacy in NSW, the parliament at the very least should be putting legislative protections in place to ensure that children born into these arrangements in the future are not deprived of having both a mum and a dad.

“While we understand the desire of adults to have children, we should not be placing those desires above the rights of a child to have both a mother and a father. Children are not commodities and their interests should always come before the desires of adults,” Mr Hutt said.

Mr Hutt said while there is clearly a need to regulate surrogacy, the Surrogacy Bill does not go far enough. If the NSW Surrogacy Bill goes ahead in its current form it would mean that two men or two women would with State backing be able to put in an order for a baby through surrogacy.

“Clearly it is not in the best interests of children for the State to allow them to be conceived through surrogacy arrangements and then placed in an unnatural family construct that denies them a mother or a father,” he said.

“This is a form of social engineering and experimentation with children which would further undermine the natural family in a way that would be of great concern to many people in NSW.”

Mr Hutt urged NSW parliamentarians to fully consider the social implications of the legislation and at the very least amend it to ensure that future children born through surrogacy arrangements have the benefit of both a mother and a father.

“The Australian Christian Lobby does not support surrogacy at all. We believe that governments should be concerned about the genetic bewilderment and relational and legal consequences of surrogacy even where married heterosexual couples are involved. However if the Government is putting laws in place to regulate surrogacy then we urge them to ensure that children have the benefit of the love and role models of both a mother and a father – something we believe there is broad community support for,” he said.